PIHM: 5 LGBTQ+ Horror Movies I Actually Like

I am one of those people who takes media way too seriously. I’ve worked as a critic and a content creator and I’ve been an editor at so, SO many horror startups. One of my last freelance jobs I actually had the title of “horror media expert” and it was basically just my job to come in and rank horror movies.

My love language is sharing movies and shows with my partner because I feel like horror often represents me in a way that words can’t always manage.

I get too invested in characters and I take it way too personally when someone hates my favorite stories because they feel like a part of me. I learn so much about myself through watching characters I relate to or am baffled by, and I think of all of my favorite pieces of media as little bits of me. The horror genre has been very formative.

A few years ago, I actually wrote a piece for Off Limits Press about how my aversion to certain LGBTQ+ tropes in horror helped me live the lie that I was straight for a long time. But I never looked for queer relationships in my media unless they were spelled out for me, and I didn’t like a lot of the movies that my queer friends liked. Even once I came out of the closet to myself and my family, I still felt like there was this barrier between me and queer horror.

There are a lot of horror movies that have been embraced by the community that I just really hate personally that left me feeling very alienated. I think the music in Rocky Horror Picture Show is terrible. I think The Lost Boys is super overrated. I refuse to accept that Jesse from A Nightmare on Elm Street pt 2 is good representation when the “thing” he is repressing is a demon known for touching kids and he’s cured by the love of a straight girl who’s been chasing him. Even if I was willing to overlook that, Snyder (who is canonically gay) could NOT have been a positive role model for anyone. (Again, he is a character interested in BDSM who is shown taking pleasure in being cruel to and punishing high school boys.)

It’s hard to constantly feel like a damper on these pieces of media that I know were formative to my friends. But it was also hard to not feel like I had any horror that represented me, or that I felt comfortable with in regards to my identity. This was especially true because there are a lot of tropes that my LGBTQ+ friends seemed to relate to and seek out that I also just wasn’t super into, such as vampires and werewolves. (I actually dissect this in my Off Limits Press piece as well, because I think we inherently resonate with transformation tropes, I just don’t like how a lot of creature features portray this.)

The closest thing I had to representation in horror that I liked for a long time was Haute Tension, and to say that it was still problematic would be a massive understatement.

But as I get more comfortable in my horror tastes and in my label as pansexual, I have learned that I don’t hate queer horror. I’m just picky.

That’s why I wanted to share this short, but carefully curated list of LGBTQ+ horror media that I actually really love. If there are any of you elder millennial queers who, like me, grew up in the era of torture porn and are looking for some more disturbing recommendations for Pride Month, look no further. I’ve got you covered.

So here are 5 LGBTQ+ horror movies that I actually like. (This list is spoiler free, but please, whenever you take ANY movie recommendation from me, consult trigger warnings if you need them, and that goes doubly so for this list.)

•   Martyrs

Martyrs is the movie that inspired my first queer media article. It was the first horror movie I ever saw that made me resonate with queer themes in a way that got me questioning my identity.

I think this is largely because transformation and transcendence are big themes in the film. That was something that really spoke to me just before and while I was coming out, but it helped that I just enjoyed the movie as a piece of art. I got to see a horror transformation that didn’t feel as overplayed to me as vampires and werewolves both did at that time.

It wasn’t until a few years after I’d seen it for the first time that I even realized Anna is canonically queer as well.

•   The Perfection

This is another one that deals with transformation, but it’s impossible to miss the lesbian aspect here. The chemistry between the two love interests I think is absolutely unmatched, not just in queer horror but possibly in any movie ever. It makes me really root for them as a couple, even through the many terrible twists and turns of their journey.

•   Huesera: The Bone Woman

This is probably the least graphic film on my list, which is weird, because I think it’s also one of the most viscerally disturbing. I think anyone in the community who ever weighed the life they wanted with the life they told they were supposed to want, is going to really resonate with the protagonist of this movie.

•   X

This is, for sure, the least blatantly queer movie on my list, but I will die on this hill. If the community can claim The Babadook and the phone from Skinamarink as gay icons, I can choose a few from X.

It’s challenging for me to talk about my full reasoning behind this pick without getting into spoiler territory, so proceed with caution. In a movie where the thrill of violence is equated to sexual gratification, I find it impossible not to linger on the victim preferences of our main antagonist.

Furthermore, I will die on the hill the Bobby-Lynn Parker is pansexual. It’s a label I don’t get to see often called out in horror movies, but I’ve never seen a character who is more in tune with my personal beliefs about sexual orientations. It’s a real “you know it when you see it” sort of situation, and I will not be swayed from this assessment.

•   Hellraiser

I’m actually sneaking a sixth movie in here by refusing to put a year on this pick. While I prefer Clive Barker’s original 1987 film, which is more true to the plot of the novella that inspired it, I actually think both versions are great and acceptable for Pride Month. I particularly like the more androgynous approach to the Cenobytes in the remake, which helped bring those queer themes from the novella into sharper focus.

by Cat Voleur
Twitter: @Cat_Voleur
cat.voleur.com